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The War on Terror Spectator
Keeping the Militants Happy
Anti-Americanism is the strongest glue known to mankind.
The headline of the week (from the AP): “Some militants respond positively to Obama speech.” It is perhaps instructive to take a headline like this and replace today’s evildoers with one from the past and see what you come up with: “Some Nazis respond positively to Roosevelt’s address.” Or, “Some Mongol Warlords have nice things to say about Pope Innocent’s bull.”
Now read the entire story and one finds the lone example of a positive response to President Obama’s Cairo speech comes from some Egyptian named Essam Derbala, a leader of the Islamic militant group al-Gamaa al-Islamiyya Al-Qaida. Derbala is said to have “told an Egyptian newspaper over the weekend that the Taliban should reciprocate by announcing they will no longer target Americans.” The obvious problem is the Taliban could care less what some guy in Egypt thinks they should or should not do. Nor are they likely to give American soldiers a free pass when U.S. troops are still trying to kill them.
Meanwhile my local newspaper today reports that “a Canadian soldier and an Afghan boy died in…attacks by the [Taliban] extremist insurgency…” If — as a result of Obama’s speech — the Taliban are now targeting Canadian rather than American troops, Prime Minister Stephen Harper had better start brushing up on his Koran and get on the first jet to Cairo.
There is nothing in this or any other story I’ve seen to suggest extremists have had a change of heart toward the U.S. And writing a curious and misleading headline won’t make it so.
Of course, if you can’t find a militant to say that Americans are now welcome in the Islamic world, you can always find some Yankee Think-Tanker who will put those or similar words in the collective Muslim mouth. “Obama may have managed to ‘plant the seed of doubt in some minds’ of extremists, said Robert Malley, of the International Crisis Group,” according to the AP story. ”Seed of doubt” is a lovely metaphor, sort of like “the cloud of unknowing,” but it is unclear what doubts extremists had planted in their fertile brains. Are they having doubts whether America is still the Great Satan? So they doubt whether Western culture is still decadent? Or, more likely, are they having doubts about the West’s commitment to defeat the Taliban and Al Qaeda?
Malley continued: “There was enough … that represented openings for those who wanted openings.” Some might say the notion that extremists and terrorists are looking for peace openings is the height of naïveté. If they wanted peace would they be blowing up mosques and Humvees? Pundits sometimes forget that not everyone is as awestruck with Obama and his message as they are. To Islamic militants, Obama is just the latest representative of earthly evil.
ON THE CONTRARY the story suggests that nearly all Islamic militants responded negatively to Obama’s speech and did so, not because they weren’t swept away on a tide of pro-Western good feelings, but because they feared alienating or irritating their fellow militants. Here’s how the AP put it:
Two influential fundamentalist groups, Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah and Egypt’s opposition Muslim Brotherhood, as well as a Saudi preacher, accused Obama of being deceptive. They said he offered soft words to hide unchanged anti-Muslim positions. But that could indicate their nervousness that Obama’s strategy could undercut support for militancy.
You see how it works? When militant leaders say Obama is a liar, they don’t really mean that Obama is a liar. They only say Obama is a liar because they are nervous about losing support among their bloodthirsty militant backers. It’s a kind of doublespeak that only AP reporters are privy too.
The story would have us believe the Islamic militants’ “positive response” is due largely to Obama’s doomed Israel Policy. This policy — destined to go down in history as a corollary to Chamberlain’s Munich Agreement — is to appease extremists by taking a tougher line with Israel. This is a popular notion throughout the Arab punditocracy. “Extremists will only be disarmed when the U.S. takes a more neutral stand on Israel,” says Abdel Wahab al-Qasab, a Qatar-based analyst. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, however, doesn’t give a damn about Obama’s appeasement policy. Netanyahu ran for the premiership on a platform that included “natural growth” within the Jerusalem municipality, an area that includes Arab East Jerusalem and parts of the West Bank captured in a 1967 Middle East war. He intends to hold to that.
The story does get one thing right. The region is growing more militant, not less so. Largely because hatred of the U.S. is the militants’ bread and butter. Without that hatred the militants and their big dollar supporters will simply put away their purses and go home to watch Law & Order: Crimes Against the Prophet Unit. Anti-Americanism is the strongest glue known to mankind. It holds the weak European Left together and it binds militant Islam. It is the raison d’être for most of the world’s tinpot dictatorships. Selling out Israel will not make the paste any less sticky.
About the Author
Christopher Orlet writes from St. Louis.
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Marc Jeric| 6.10.09 @ 7:34AM
Our MSM Obama's acolytes proclaimed his Cairo speech as "transformational, historic, presidential" and more such superlatives. What I heard though was this: "blah-blah...sorry...blah-blah... my father Muslim...me too (maybe)...sorry...will do better...sorry...blah-blah...screw Israel...sorry...". Abu Hussein completely met my expectations.
Louis Jenkins| 6.10.09 @ 8:56AM
Obama has gained "Peace in our Time!" All this speech amounted to was hot wind. It gained nothing, and futher widened the chasm between Israel and the US. Even if Israel was out of the picture the Islamofacists would still reproach the US on the basis of our way of life. The Islamofacists must have someone to hate, and it can't be legislated away as in the US by hate crime bills, feel good laws, or touchy feely speeches. The Muslim leaders must rail against the Western World. It gives them a common purpose instead of fighting among themselves as in past times.
Ned| 6.10.09 @ 9:15AM
I think we all better buckle up. When you show weakness on the world stage, someone is gonna try and knock you off it.
NavyBrat| 6.10.09 @ 10:22AM
Obama is indeed an appeaser. History is replete with those who've whistled past the graveyard of those who thought that appeasement was the way to avoid the horrors of war. The fact is, appeasement brings about those horrors due to the weakness that the party who engages in it is perceived to have.
"An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last."...Churchill
"One ought never to turn one's back on a threatened danger & try to run away from it. If you do that, you will double the danger. But if you meet it promptly & without flinching, you will reduce the danger by half."...Churchill
Of course, we all know Obama hates Churchill, as was evidenced by the return to the British Embassy of the statue of Churchill that was given to us after 9-11 & sat in the Oval Office. Must not have looked good next to his Che Guevera bust.
"If he yields it from fear, it is for the purpose of avoiding a war, & he will rarely escape from that; for he to whom he has from cowardice conceded the one thing will not be satisfied, but will want to take other things from him, & his arrogance will increase as his esteem for the prince is lessened."...Machiavelli, The Discourses
"One ought never to allow a disorder to take place in order to avoid a war, for war is not thereby avoided, but only deferred to your disadvantage."...Machiavelli, The Prince
Son Of Sam | 6.10.09 @ 12:03PM
WTF are y'all talking about? Of COURSE all terrorist scumbags world wide were incredibly positive about Obama's speech. Not only did the TelePrompter In Chief paste a gigantic "kick me" sign on our backs, he wrote it out in French, German, Russian, Chinese,Arabic, Farsi, Pashtun etc etc etc. Then he stood up in the heart of the Middle East and pointed to it as vigorously as possible. Then the tingly-legged lapdog media in this country trumpeted it over and over again, just in case anyone had missed it the first time.
"Positive"? I'd say the headchoppers and bombthrowers around the world were absolutely chortling with glee. Evildoeers the world over haven't had such a shot in the arm since Jimmy Carter talked about ending our "inordinate fear of communism"
stand strong until freedom dawns
Son Of Sam
http://www.samadamssos.bravehost.com
Pingback| 6.10.09 @ 12:29PM
Anti Americanism: The strongest glue known to mankind. « Sigmund, Carl and Alfred links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Tim| 6.10.09 @ 12:47PM
Rooster Cogburn: Mr. Rat, I have a writ here says you're to stop eating Chin Lee's cornmeal forthwith. Now it's a rat writ, writ for a rat, and this is lawful service of the same. See, doesn't pay any attention to me.
[shoots the rat]
Chen Lee: [Runs into the room] Outside is place for shooting!
Rooster Cogburn: I'm servin' some papers!
Tim| 6.10.09 @ 12:51PM
Rooster Cogburn: You can't serve papers on a rat, baby sister. You gotta kill him or let him be.
Pingback| 6.10.09 @ 1:15PM
Keeping the Militants Happy - Spectator.org « AddingInfo.com links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Roger McKinney| 6.10.09 @ 1:24PM
You'll have to ignore the MSM and search through Middle Eastern English language sites to find it, but Obama is having a big impact on the Middle East just by being President. Arabs were stunned that a black man with a Muslim background and Arab name could become president of the US. Young people in particular compare sorry state of minorities and their lack of freedom in their own country with Obama's success and realize that the US is a very different country from what their political leaders and the militants claim. His speech doesn't matter. The man giving the speech mattered a great deal. check out this http://www.aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=2&id=17009
Roger McKinney| 6.10.09 @ 1:26PM
PS, Expecting a speech to change the minds of militants is ridiculous. Even Allah can't change their minds. We should use more realistic criteria for judging the speech.
Pingback| 6.10.09 @ 3:00PM
The American Spectator : Keeping the Militants Happy links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 6.10.09 @ 3:30PM
The American Spectator : Keeping the Militants Happy | Israel Today links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 6.10.09 @ 3:30PM
The American Spectator : Keeping the Militants Happy | Israel Today links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
The Halliburton FRAUD| 6.10.09 @ 4:09PM
Iraq and Corporate Patriotism: It's Time to Stop the War Profiteers
by Charlie Cray
Hundreds of Americans soldiers have made the ultimate sacrifice for a war that was sold to the American public through what is now clear were misleading assertions about an imminent threat from Saddam's weapons of mass destruction and ties to al Qaeda. Now American taxpayers are being asked to pay an additional $87 billion for the ongoing occupation and reconstruction of Iraq. As occupying powers, the U.S. and UK are obligated to provide for the humanitarian needs of the Iraqi people and the reconstruction of the country's infrastructure. But this doesn't mean that taxpayers should hand over a blank check with no strings attached.
There is strong reason to fear that the contracting bonanza will serve only to enrich the Bush administration's corporate cronies rather than the Iraqi people. As talks about privatizing Iraq's economy continue (before a constitutional government is established that would have the authority to make such decisions), recent news reports suggest that top Republican lobbyists like former FEMA director Joe Allbaugh and former House Appropriations Committee chairman Bob Livingston (R-LA) are lining up clients who stand to benefit. Rep. James Moran (D-VA) has complained that a company from his district was essentially told that "if they want the money they really have to go through Halliburton." If it's that bad for companies with connections to the Democrats, it's hard to imagine how much more difficult it must be for Iraqi engineers and contractors - who can't afford Allbaugh or Livingston's consulting fees -- to access the process.
Halliburton has so far racked up over $1.7 billion and stands to make hundreds of millions more (possibly billions) under a no-bid contract awarded by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. As Congressman Waxman (whose office has closely monitored the Halliburton handouts) put it, "the amount of money [earned by Halliburton] is quite staggering, far more than we were originally led to believe … it concerns me because often the privatization of government services ends up costing the taxpayers more money rather than less."
Democratic Senate leader Tom Daschle's has uncovered examples of items in the draft appropriations request that are reminiscent of Reagan-era Pentagon hammers and toilet seats, including $200,000 per person witness protection -- nearly 20 times cost of U.S. program -- and hand-held radio and satellite phones that cost an average $6,000 each.
Cost overruns and Cheney's ongoing financial ties to Halliburton are not the only reasons that Congress should hold hearings on war profiteering. The contracts have been regularly awarded to companies with a track record of corporate crime and excessive executive compensation. Enron and Arthur Anderson were immediately suspended from all federal contracts after their accounting fraud was revealed (and before they were convicted of any crimes), but everyone seems to have forgotten that the SEC is still investigating what went on at Halliburton while Cheney was CEO. And Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has yet to reply to Waxman's April letter asking for an explanation why the Pentagon is contracting with a company (Halliburton) that is apparently using a Cayman Islands subsidiary to conduct business in Iran, a member of the President's "axis of evil."
As members of Congress to take up the $87 billion Iraq appropriations request, they should continue to be on guard for corporate war profiteering and apply the following conditions to the contracts to ensure that taxpayers are protected:
1) Full Dislosure. End all no-bid contracts like the multi-billion dollar contract awarded to Halliburton before the start of the war. All companies bidding for contracts should meet rigorous standards of accountability, and should be required to submit their history of compliance with securities, labor, environmental and tax laws as part of any contract bid.
2) Ban Corporate Tax Dodgers From the Contracts. In 2002 the President said, "we ought to look at people who are trying to avoid U.S. taxes as a problem. I think American companies ought to pay taxes here and be good citizens." Companies that move their headquarters to offshore tax havens and otherwise use offshore subsidiaries to avoid paying their fair share of taxes should be ineligible for taxpayer-funded contracts. The IRS estimates that offshore tax scams cost the Treasury $70 billion per year - almost as much as the supplemental request.
3) Stop Excess War Profits: Rein in CEO Pay. Defenders of sky-high CEO pay often argue that corporate leaders bear tremendous responsibilities and must oversee complicated business activities. But many of the companies that have received Iraq reconstruction contracts award their top executives pay packages that are 30 to 175 times as much as a U.S. army general with 20 years experience ($145,000). For example, Lockheed Martin CEO Vance Coffman receives $4.1 million in salary and bonuses, plus more than $20 million in options grants; last year he made nearly 2,000 times the pay of an entry-level soldier. Congress should keep in mind President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's sentiment in the aftermath of WWII, when he said, "I don't want to see a single war millionaire created in the United States as a result of this world disaster."
4) No Contracts for Corporate Crooks. On the same day in May that the Pentagon awarded WorldCom/MCI a contract to provide wireless service in Baghdad, the SEC announced that it was penalizing the company for the largest accounting fraud in corporate history. WorldCom/MCI has sopped well over a billion dollars in taxpayer money through government contracts since the fraud was revealed, including a $17 million contract awarded by the House in July, just as several members of Congress were trying to block the company from doing business with the federal government. The situation became so embarrassing that the General Services Administrator finally announced at the end of July that MCI would be suspended from all government contracts. But we shouldn't have to wait that long for law-breaking companies to be barred from receiving taxpayer-funded contracts.
The additional reconstruction funds should not have to come from ordinary taxpayers, but should be raised from an excess profits tax on corporations benefiting from the war and post-war privatization in Iraq, and a restored tax on the wealthiest 1% of Americans. Anyone concerned about corporate war profiteering should let Congress and the media hear their concerns.
For more information contact: Corporate Policy Project, ccray@essentialinformation.org
###
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30'000 Suicide USA Soldiers| 6.10.09 @ 4:16PM
A Deep Breath America!
As far as suicides among active duty soldiers and veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are concerned, we in America have just seen the tip of the iceberg.
Three tours will be tripple the chance of suicide.
Four tours will be four times the chance of suicide.
Soldiers deleted like unwanted e-mails.
Take in a deep breath America, the wars are coming home to the stuffed closets of your mind.
When I was in Vietnam toward the end of the war, this is what I saw.
Blood on my hands, brains in my lap.
Mike Hastie
U.S. Army Medic
Vietnam 1970-71
February 9, 2009
Pingback| 6.10.09 @ 5:46PM
The American Spectator : Keeping the Militants Happy | Egypt today links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
S.L. Toddard| 6.11.09 @ 7:03PM
"This policy -- destined to go down in history as a corollary to Chamberlain's Munich Agreement -- is to appease extremists"
Hahaha. I was afraid I was going to get through the whole piece (of what, I won't say) without a Chamberlain/appeasement reference! You know, I shudder to think that it was only a couple years ago when that tactic would still have worked. That was back when the now marginalized, fringe right was still relevant. No longer - Likudnik extremist neoconservatives are now preaching to an ever-shrinking choir, all their fear-mongering and so forth is now seen for what it is by the majority of Americans - the paranoid, terror-stricken ranting of a discredited, failed, fringe faction so far outside the mainstream as to be hardly worthy of notice.
Fortunately for the United States, Americans have woken up and want a more even-handed approach to the Middle East - one where we do not blindly favor Israel over her neighbors. And why should we? What national interest is served in doing so? They are a small, rather insignificant Middle Eastern country with no oil. Not only does our relationship with Israel *not* benefit us, it actually damages our national security by earning us the hatred of the Muslim world - and Americans are (finally) recognizing this fact.
You will see America dividing into two camps - one who believes America should put its national security first, and one who believes instead of doing that we should continue blindly supporting Israel. The former will continue to grow while the latter shrinks to insignificance.
Pingback| 6.12.09 @ 12:47PM
Steynian 363 « Free Canuckistan! links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Richard Baker| 6.13.09 @ 5:48PM
With all the grousing around the world maybe we should have left the Imperial Japanese, Nazis, and the USSR alone so these whiners would REALLY have something to complain about. Maybe America First was right.
S.L. Toddard| 6.14.09 @ 11:20AM
"With all the grousing around the world maybe we should have left the Imperial Japanese, Nazis, and the USSR alone so these whiners would REALLY have something to complain about. Maybe America First was right."
America First *was* right - then we were attacked, and defended ourselves. WWII was a war fought according to non-interventionist (i.e. "isolationist") principles.
Pingback| 6.25.09 @ 1:08PM
Keeping the Militants Happy « Depravity links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Joe| 5.9.11 @ 3:58PM
Isolationist or not, the world's problems will still affect the nation and vice versa.
http://www.wildplanettours.com/